Orgone energy and UFOs

As I have investigated the UFO Phenomena over the years, I often found myself in awe at the dedication of so many Ufologists whose passion for the truth became a lifelong endeavor. For many, this passion became an obsession trying to piece together the puzzle of what is decidedly the greatest mystery of our times. Soon I found myself on the edge of this same obsessive precipice, looking into the vast darkness of UFO data, knowing that there had to be something real to this phenomenon so widely witnessed and experienced.

Wilhelm Reich, Orgone Energy, and UFOs
By Peter Robbins
For Third Annual Crash and Retrieval Symposium
Las Vegas, Nevada, November 4-6, 2005
Brief opening remarks
I‟d like to begin by saying that my academic background is in the arts
and I make no claim to any formal scientific background or credentials. But
many years of study and much practical experience have led me to conclude
that the most important single body of scientific knowledge codified in the
Twentieth Century remains it‟s most ignored, distorted, and confounded. In
short, it‟s most controversial.
The late author, educator and ufologist Jerome Eden used to refer to
UFOs as the idiot child of the media. I respectfully suggest that the truth
about Wilhelm Reich and UFOs is an, if not the idiot child of ufology. My
intention here is to familiarize you with the specifics of this remarkable
episode in Post War History.
To best appreciate this account it‟s important that we view it in some
scientific and political context. Time constraints necessitate my keeping this
talk to under an hour, and I hope the companion paper that appears in your
proceedings will help to answer some of the questions left unaddressed here.
It also lists all of my information sources.
Photo 1 – Portrait of Reich (May 1946)
The common functioning principle unifying this science, named
orgonomy by its discoverer, is the study of how energy functions in the
living and the non-living realms of nature. Orgonomy offers ground-
breaking applications in fields as diverse as biology, psychology,
meteorology, sociology, cancer research, human sexuality, child rearing,
political science, and UFO studies. But some of its key findings challenge
accepted physical laws, and by extension, some of society‟s most significant
social and moral underpinnings, and for many, that was, and remains
unforgivable.
During his lifetime Wilhelm Reich was the target of attacks from both
the left and the right, but his work and findings were especially reviled by
uncomprehending liberals, communists and active Soviet agents who more
than understood the danger his work represented to their cause, especially as
articulated in such books as The Mass Psychology of Fascism. Reich‟s
attacks on Soviet-style communism were, and continue to be dismissed as
the paranoid delusions of a formerly brilliant mind, but we can confirm that
many of his related observations proved to be hyper accurate, and in some
cases even prophetic.
But it was Reich‟s acceptance of UFOs as a physical reality that dealt
his professional reputation its most stunning blow. When you study the
progression of his scientific investigations and discoveries, his 1953 entry
into UFO studies was clearly the next logical step along a scientific path he
had been following for almost forty years. In fact, the development of one of
his most important scientific apparatus‟s both preceded and predicated his
interest in UFOs.
Photo 2 – Dr. Richard Blasband operating a cloudbuster in Bucks County
(I think) PA in the 1970s
The cloudbuster is made up of a series of long metal pipes grounded
in deep or running water by attached lengths of hollow industrial bx cable.
When properly employed, it is capable of altering weather patterns in the
surrounding atmosphere. The principle it operates under is deceptively
simple. The elevated pipes create atmospheric movement by „drawing down‟
atmospheric energy and harmlessly grounded it in the deep or moving water
its cables are submerged in. This movement is capable of breaking up a
stagnant weather front by attracting moisture-rich air into the area, and to the
locations in route of the direction one is drawing from. I know how this may
sound to many of you, and if it strains my credibility with you, so be it. I can
only say that I‟ve studies the reports of responsible cloudbusting operations
for several decades and have watched as a cloudbuster dramatically changed
the complexion of the sky over southern New Jersey in the course of about
twenty minutes, so „belief‟ in the reality of this technology doesn‟t really
enter into the equation for me. But there was a complication. Some of these
weather modification operations attracted UFOs – first over southern Maine
in 1953, then above Arizona in 1954, where weeks of cloudbusting
culminated in what can only be characterized as a „battle‟ in the skies over
Tucson. Wild as these allegations may sound, they were well-documented
and multiply witnessed. But I‟m getting ahead of myself..
Photo 3 – Reich at age 3
Wilhelm Reich was born in the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1897.
His father was a stern government bureaucrat, his artistic mother, a piano
teacher. „Willi‟ and his brother Robert grew up on the family‟s rural estate
observing nature and natural functioning first hand on a daily basis. Both
were educated by private tutors. Though half Christian and half Jewish by
birth, Reich never practiced either religion, and grew to observe that all
organized religions tend to be the source of considerably more ignorance and
suffering than enlightenment or happiness. In 1914 the Balkans erupted into
flames, and over the next four years World War One swept the empire and
the family estate into oblivion.
Photo 4 – Training in trench warfare, 1916
Reich served with distinction as an artillery officer in the Austro-
Hungarian Army until war‟s end. With all of the family‟s holdings now
vaporized, he made his way to Vienna where he enrolled in medical school,
supporting himself as a tutor for the duration of his studies.
Photo 5 - Reich following WWI
He was drawn to Vienna in part because of his intense interest in the
pioneering work of Dr. Sigmund Freud. After graduating medical school he
became a pupil of Freud‟s, then went on to work as a psychoanalyst and as
Freud‟s assistant for the next six years.
Photo 6 – Members of the Psychoanalytic Polyclinic, Vienna, 1922
(Reich is seated forth from left, first row)
The two parted ways in 1929 when Reich, after much clinical work
and observation in the early psychoanalytic tradition, presented case findings
to Freud supporting his view that literally all human neurosis were, at their
deepest levels, rooted in some form of sexual dysfunction. Freud and his
followers subscribed to the theory that many neurosis had a sexual basis, but
all of them? Well, this was more than Victorian Vienna or the mental health
professionals of the 1920s were able to accept. Reich‟s departure from the
Freudian ranks created a backlash of resentment among many of his
colleagues and resulted in the origin of the myth of his mental instability. It
was something that would follow him for the rest of his life.
Photo 7 – Reich, third from left, with a group of communist sympathizers,
Vienna, 1927
The young doctor and veteran became involved with the Austrian
Communist Party in 1927, his intention being to marry the revolutionary
mission of their already-existing mental health clinics to the restoration of
healthy sexual functioning in workers. Responsible sex education and
contraceptives were freely disseminated at these so-called „Sexpol‟
(sex/politics) Clinics, and their popularity extended from Austria into
Germany, until the collapse of the Vimar Republic, and into the Soviet
Union, where for a time they were allowed to thrive. Much to the upset of
the communists however, sexually healthy workers, be they party members
or not, tended to put their own personal happiness and goals above those of
the party, a travesty that could not be allowed to stand. By 1934 Reich had
been expelled from the Communist Party, their rationale being that the once-
brilliant young scientist was now manifesting symptoms of insanity. The
essence of his alleged mental illness is reflected in this obviously unhinged
statement, “This is what I am fighting for: the prevention of emotional
human misery by the establishment of a normal and natural – that is,
orgastically satisfying – human life in the masses of people.” To any group
or individual intent on controlling the lives and thoughts of others, these are
the words of a truly dangerous man. The party never forgave him for this
and efforts to damage his reputation and impugn his work became
commonplace from 1934 on. Reich remained an avowed anticommunist for
the rest of his life.
Photo 8 – Reich in Berlin, 1932
Driven from Austria, then from Germany, he immigrated to Norway.
Here he continued with his experiments and therapeutic practice aided by a
core group of colleagues, and devoting much of his experimental work and
study to the dynamics of cancer formation. His outstanding books The
Impulsive Character, Character Analysis, People In Trouble, The Mass
Psychology of Fascism and The Cancer Biopathy were all written during this
period. He immigrated to the United States in 1939 and was invited to join
the faculty of New York City‟s New School for Social Research the
following year. He settled in Forest Hills, Queens, a then-quiet district of the
borough where he established a private practice, continued his writing, and
refined his character analytic therapy, or medical orgone therapy as it
became known. Energetic functioning in people was now his primary
interest and his key efforts were directed toward dissolving the chronic
muscular contractions of his patients, the „armoring‟ which served to block
natural feeling and hold neurotic behavior in place.
Photo 9 – “The Orgone Energy Accumulator – Its Scientific and Medical
Use”
It was during this time that Reich discovered the specifically
biological energy which he called orgone, and a simple therapeutic and
experimental device that could concentrate the energy and allow it to be
measured in a laboratory setting. He named the apparatus the orgone energy
accumulator, or ORAC. The size of the accumulators Reich and his
associates constructed over the years varied, from that of a small box, up to
that of a large room. A properly constructed accumulator is made up of
alternating layers of organic and inorganic material; steel wool and
fiberboard were found to be ideal for the purpose. The non-metallic
(organic) material tends to attract and hold the atmospheric energy, while the
metal (inorganic) also attracted the energy, but, unable to absorb it, rapidly
reflected it. As such, the exterior of an ORAC is always constructed of an
organic layer, while the interior surface must be metallic. The accumulator
works on the basis of what Reich termed the orgonomic potential. That is,
unlike the conventional energy systems we are accustomed to thinking in
terms of in which the energetic potential moves from the stronger system
(the source), to the weaker one, orgone energy flows from the weaker
system to the stronger.
Photo 10 – orgone accumulator schematic
Reich persevered with experiments designed to isolate and confirm
the reality of this energy, but aware of the controversy an announcement of
such a discovery might create, he continued to verify his findings without
seeking either public acknowledgement or official scientific verification.
One of the experiments he developed was calculated to measure the heat
inside of an accumulator and compare it with the temperature inside an
identical sized control box. The experiment was named To-T (T oh minus
T). Reich and his colleagues observed that a change in the atmosphere would
alter the temperature differential, and To-T established itself to be a reliable
predictor of changes in the weather. If there is a conventional explanation for
this temperature differential, one that can be demonstrated under laboratory
conditions, I‟m not aware of it.
Photo 11 – Cover sheet of “The Einstein Affair”
In late December 1940, Reich sent a carefully worded letter about his
work to Albert Einstein. The letter, written in German, said, in part, “Several
years ago I discovered a specific biological energy which in many ways
behaves differently from anything that is known about electromagnetic
energy. The matter is too complicated and sounds too improbable to be
explained clearly in a brief letter. I can only indicate that I have evidence
that the energy, which I have called orgone, exists not only in living
organisms, but also in the soil and in the atmosphere; it is visible and can be
concentrated and measured {emphasis his}, and I am using it with some
success in research on cancer therapy.” The physicist responded by letter six
days later, apparently intrigued enough to invite Reich to demonstrate this
claim in person. The meeting was arranged through Einstein‟s secretary-
assistant, Helen Dukas, and set for January 13, 1941.
Photo 11 – January 9, 1941 letter from WR to Dukas
That afternoon the two men met for more than four hours. Reich had
brought along several experimental devices to demonstrate his findings and
Einstein observed the glowing orgone energy for himself through a
laboratory apparatus designed for that purpose. Seemingly unwilling to
believe his own eyes, the great physicist acknowledged the decided glow,
but refused to rule out what he described as “the subjective element.” It was
toward the end of their meeting that Reich told Einstein of the measurable
heat created inside the accumulator and their conversation then shifted to the
implications of such a discovery. Reich noted in his diary that Einstein‟s
response had been, “That is impossible. Should this be true, it would be a
great bomb {to physics}.” An understandable reaction given that the heat
differential repeatedly observed in this experiment violated the Second Law
of Thermodynamics – that is, that equal volumes tend to equalize in
temperature. In anticipation of the meeting Reich wrote, “Orgone constitutes
the „field‟ that Einstein is searching for. Electricity, magnetism, gravitation,
etc., depend on its functions.” Following their discussion, Einstein stated
that he wanted to verify this temperature differential for himself and Reich
agreed to return to Princeton the following week with the necessary lab
equipment.
Einstein spent a week conducting and studying To-T, and on February
7 wrote to Reich that he had confirmed (and reconfirmed) the scientist‟s
findings: the accumulator had registered an average 0.3-0.4 degree
(centigrade) higher than in the control box. But then one of Einstein‟s
assistants offered a simple explanation: the differential had been caused by
“convection:” that is the difference between the air temperatures under and
above the table the accumulator had been placed on – Einstein had set it on a
table top and suspended the control box in the air. He closed his letter to
Reich, “I hope this {explanation} will awaken your sense of skepticism, so
that you will not allow yourself to be deceived by an illusion that can be
easily explained. Please have someone pick up your instruments, since they
are of some value. They are undamaged. With friendly greetings, A.
Einstein.”
Stung, Reich wrote back imploring Einstein to re-conduct the
experiment, but this time following the strict protocols he‟d devised to
eliminate such a false explanation. In his letter Reich even describes his
having repeatedly and successfully conducting To-T with both boxes buried
underground, thus eliminating any possibility of “convection,” but Einstein
seemed to have lost all interest. Reich thought it memorable that the
physicist had been so willing to accept the first rationale that had come
along, and at his refusal to re-conduct the experiment under properly
controlled conditions. The letter ended with a moving plea for some respect
and consideration, but none was forthcoming. We do not know if Einstein
even saw this letter. At the time all of his mail would have been screened by
Helen Dukas, who may have had her own reasons for not wanting her
employer to confirm Reich‟s findings. Both Ms. Dukas and Dr. Einstein
were put under fairly close observation by the FBI from the time they first
entered this country in 1933, and while the FBI was aware of the physicist‟s
left-leaning sympathies, they strongly suspected Ms. Dukas of being an
active asset of Soviet intelligence since at least 1929. There is credible
evidence to support their belief, some of which is included in the
proceedings. Letters from Reich and his colleagues and from Einstein and
his assistants continued to change hands over the next few years, but without
resolve.
Photo 13 – Mildred Edie Brady
The Federal Drug Administration began to build its case against
Wilhelm Reich in 1947. The red flag that had alerted them to the danger he
and his work posed to the American public was an extraordinarily vicious
and inaccurate article written by a journalist named Mildred Edie Brady.
“The Strange Case of Wilhelm Reich” appeared in the May 26, 1947 issue
of The New Republic; other biased and distorted articles followed. Time
Magazine‟s offering was entitled “The Marvelous Sex Box.” Brady‟s article
was a masterpiece of distortion and attacked Reich‟s “sex racket” while
trumpeting an out-and-out lie; namely, that he had stated the orgone
accumulator was a cure-all. Mrs. Brady was not your routine freelancer. She
had a history of involvement with far left causes and was, among other
things, a respected member of the drug regulation elite who actively helped
to create FDA legislation as early as 1938. She was also a founder of
Consumers Union, which at the time was a communist-dominated
organization that had broken away from Consumers Research, Inc. Brady
was also professionally associated with one of Reich‟s lawyers: Arthur
Garfield Hays, who was a sponsor of Consumers Union.
There is no question that The New Republic article was clearly
libelous, and Hays‟ client instructed him to initiate an appropriate libel
action against Mrs. Brady and the magazine; Reich‟s medical colleagues
agreed. Incredibly, Hays talked his client out of pressing the action, and the
scientist, unfortunately, took his counselor‟s advice. This proved to be a
crucial misstep. Other scurrilous articles followed, similarly devoid of
responsive legal action. Hays never informed his client that he knew and
worked with Brady, and if that were not enough, one of Reich‟s other
attorneys, Peter Mills, would go on to become the prosecuting attorney when
the case against him finally came to trial. But there was another significant
factor at play here as well, one that would have exploded on the international
stage if it had become known.
Photo 14 – Michael Straight
Jim Martin‟s tenacious investigative scholarship in Wilhelm Reich and
the Cold War has established that Michael Whitney Straight, a wealthy and
powerful American whose parents founded The New Republic magazine,
had attended Cambridge University in the nineteen thirties and was deeply
connected to and involved with the members of the legendary Cambridge
Four Soviet spy ring. As the then-owner of The New Republic and publisher
of Brady‟s scurrilous article, any legal action taken against her and his
publication could have easily put him under oath and on the stand. In an
interview Jim Martin conducted with Straight not long before his death, he
made it clear that he had suffered from ongoing guilt relating to his long-
time involvement with Soviet intelligence and might well have come clean
about his double life if anyone in officialdom had only asked him about it;
no one ever did. As such, Hays success in convincing Reich to waive legal
action against Brady and The New Republic destroyed any trial-based
possibility of revealing the degree to which Soviet intelligence had already
penetrated British intelligence in the nineteen forties.
Photo 15 – Reich’s home and laboratory in Rangeley, Maine
In the early nineteen fifties Reich moved from New York to a rural
property just outside of the town of Rangeley in southern Maine. Here he
built a new home and laboratory designed to integrate both structures into a
single, brilliantly practical building, now the home of the Wilhelm Reich
Museum. A student lab was added soon after. This structure was the setting
for the so-called Oranur Experiment, a chilling example of the accumulator‟s
undeniable ability to concentrate energy. The experiment called for the
placing of a very small amount of radium in an accumulator, the unexpected
results of which were to make a number of those participating extremely ill,
and to toxify a surprisingly large part of southern Maine, one that took
several months to dissipate. And so the stage was set for what came next.
Reich‟s interest in UFOs dates from 1953. There is no written or
anecdotal indication that he had paid any attention to all the publicity
surrounding “flying saucers” previous to this, even when in 1952, some
visitors to his home and laboratory reported seeing shining objects in the sky
that were decidedly not stars. In November 1953 though, he read one of the
best books available on the subject at the time.
Photo 16 – Flying Saucers from Outer Space
Flying Saucers from Outer Space had been written by a highly
respected and decorated World War II fighter pilot named Donald Keyhoe, a
name well known to most of us in this room. This retired Marine Corps
Major pioneered much of the basis for modern scientific UFO studies and
Reich‟s writings, as well as hand-written notations that appear in his copy of
the book, indicate he was intrigued by Keyhoe‟s observation that the
maneuverability, speed and silence of the unknowns repeatedly defied
conventional laws of mechanical flight. At the time, Reich wrote, “I had not
studied anything on the subject: I knew practically nothing about it. But my
mind, used to expecting surprises in natural research, was open to anything
that seemed real.”
Photo 17 - E. J. Ruppelt’s Report on UFOs
Keyhoe‟s book was followed by E. J. Ruppelt‟s Report on UFOs.
Ruppelt was a retired Air Force‟s Captain who had headed the Air Force‟s
UFO record-keeping and public relations program, Project Blue Book. This
book prompted Reich to note, “The Ruppelt Report on UFOs clearly reveals
the helplessness of mechanistic method in coming to grips with the problems
posed by the spacemen. The cosmic orgone energy which these living beings
are using in their technology is beyond the grasp of mechanistic science
since cosmic laws of functioning are not mechanical but what I term
“functional.” The helplessness of mechanical thinking appears in the tragic
shortcoming of our fastest fighter jets to make and hold contact with UFOs.
Being unavoidably outdistanced is not a flattering situation for military
pride. The conclusion seems correct: Mechanistic methods of locomotion
must be counted out in coping with the spaceship problem.”
One night as he sat on the steps outside his home in Maine, something
flashed by at great speed, its behavior not suggestive of a comet, meteorite,
or shooting star. Reich reported the sighting to the Air Force Base at Presque
Island, Maine; it was the first of many sighting reports he would forward to
them. In March, 1954, he sent a copy of his survey on UFOs to the Air
Force; it was actually a manuscript detailing his theoretical conclusions of
them as spacecraft.
Photo 18 – “The Oranur Experiment”
Basic to this scientist‟s understanding of the universe was the
pervasive presence of energy, implying the possibility of life in space. At
this time Reich‟s questioning encompassed the galactic currents, the
formation and destruction of star systems, and the origin of the universe
itself. Along with his deepening involvement in cloudbusting, he now began
a careful examination of the stars and set about to prove that some „stars‟ did
not behave like others. The method he used was nocturnal, time-lapse
photography. In this investigative technique, a thirty five millimeter camera
was carefully set to face the night sky with its shutter open: the experiment
proceeded with unexpected results. Some of the stars did not produce the
white lines caused by the Earth‟s rotation. These „stars‟ simply vanished
indicating that they were something else. He now began to wonder in earnest
what they might be, and specifically what they were doing in the skies over
Maine.
On October 5 and 6, three large, yellow UFOs hung low over the
southern horizon with another hovering over the observatory on Reich‟s
property. Reich saw the Oranur Experiment, with its massive pollution of the
Maine area, as the cause of the unknowns immediate interest in the region at
this time. And if these craft had harnessed the sea of energy pervading the
universe, what might be the effect of training a cloudbuster on one of them?
On October 10, a large reddish UFO appeared just to the south of the
property. The cloudbuster was trained on it and it moved. The unknown
became less red as the device kept its aim, then moved higher, and later sank
down below the horizon. Shortly thereafter, a second light appeared to the
west. After two minutes of direct drawing, it too faded, came back, flashed,
pulsated, and wobbled while moving irregularly from south to north. There
was for Reich the distinct, subjective impression of a struggle. It came back
again shortly after, and again, became fainter and smaller after drawing on it.
The remaining four unknowns then removed themselves, disappearing from
sight.
Photo 19 – Reich with cloudbuster
The results of this action were both profound and disturbing. He
writes in his last book, Contact With Space:
I hesitated for weeks to turn my cloudbuster pipes toward a “star” as if
I had known that some of the blinking lights hanging in the sky were
not planets or stars but space machines. … When I saw the “star” to
the west fade out four times in succession, what had been left of the
old world of human knowledge … tumbled beyond retrieve. From
now on everything, anything, was possible. … There was no mistake
about it. Three more people had seen it. There was only one
conclusion: The thing we had drawn from was not a star. It was
something else – a UFO … The shock of this experience was great
enough not to repeat such an action until 10 October 1954.”
While it might seem naive to some, Reich choose to address his
written concerns about UFOs directly to President Eisenhower. The White
House responded by asking him to send such future communications to the
Air Force, and to the CIA. As a result, a letter articulating his observations,
concerns and conclusions about UFOs was sent to the first Director of the
Central Intelligence Agency, a career Naval Intelligence officer named
Roscoe H. Hillenkotter.
Photo 20 – Admiral Roscoe H. Hillenkotter
The scientist would have had no way of knowing it, but in more
rarefied circles the Director was sometimes referred to by another title – MJ-
1. Not only had Reich inadvertently made contact with a member of the
President‟s Ultra Secret UFO working group, he had reached out to its top
man. Was the information he supplied to the CIA a contributing factor in
Hillenkoetter‟s becoming such a vocal opponent of UFO secrecy following
his stepping down as Director, or was this simply part of a plan to allow an
extremely highly placed operative to insinuate himself smack in the center of
civilian UFO counterculture? I cannot say, but I am convinced that if the
members of MJ-12 were not aware of Wilhelm Reich‟s UFO-related
activities prior to October 1954, they were from that time on, and would
have identified him as a man whose actions bore monitoring, and possibly
worse.
In Wilhelm Reich and the Cold War, Jim Martin identifies one other
plausible link between Reich and MJ-12. His name was Lewis W. Douglas.
Photo 21 – Lewis W. Douglas
Reich refers to Douglas briefly in Contact With Space as the Director of the
Tucson Savings and Loan, and writes that “his banking institution helped
along during the entire expedition in a most friendly and cooperative
fashion.” Douglas was also as a close associate of President Eisenhower, and
the Director of Research for the Institute of Atmospheric Physics (IAP) in
Tucson. Their first contact dates from 1954 when Reich‟s assistant, William
Moise, attempted to contact Douglas and arrange a meeting with him. As a
point of interest, it had not been Reich who suggested to Moise that he get in
touch with Douglas, but Charles Gardner, Jr., Executive Secretary of the
Advisory Committee on Weather Control for the United States government.
He was also the National Weather Bureau‟s liaison with the Institute of
Atmospheric Physics. Gardner had actually written to Moise on March 21,
1955 saying, “… we appreciate being informed of your activities.”
Douglas‟s secretary wrote up Moise‟s calls in the form of memos. The first
one read, in part, “…He {Moise} had just come from Washington and had
spoken to people in the Dept. of Agriculture, Weather Bureau and in Mr.
Gardner‟s office about weather control. They suggested that Mr. D
{Douglas} might be interested in information he had.” But no answer was
forthcoming until July 27 when Douglas cabled Moise and Reich and
Douglas began to correspond. They likely would have met in Tucson later
that year, but Douglas had to be hospitalized for cancer surgery during the
time of Reich‟s visit to Arizona.
Jim Martin and author and publisher Kenn Thomas have engaged in
some educated speculation on the possibility of a link between Lew Douglas
and MJ-12 and it is worth relating here. Douglas was known to be very close
to Eisenhower and had a pronounced interest in weather control. The
„Douglas-Moise Memo‟ is dated July 14, 1954, only ten days prior to the
seminal National Archives‟ MJ-12 document, the Cutler-Twining Memo.
Thomas reminds us that Robert Cutler had been with the CIA as a psyops
(psychological operations) expert and was certainly acquainted with
Hillenkotter (MJ-1). Cutler was also instrumental in bringing Eisenhower‟s
“Atoms for Peace” program to completion. In his memo, Cutler informs Air
Force General Nathan Twining (MJ-4) that a scheduled meeting is being
changed, and that the “Special Studies Project” would now meet during the
already scheduled White House meeting of July 16 rather than following it
as previously intended. Whatever the actual reason for this change, it insured
that President Eisenhower would be in attendance. Quoting Jim Martin:
Thomas suggests that the timing of this sequence of events might
indicate that Douglas, as a member of Eisenhower‟s “kitchen
cabinet,” may have been privy to or associated with the MJ-12 group.
I agree that Douglas, one of the most powerful men in American
politics at the time, would have known about MJ-12 if it existed.
Thomas argues that Douglas, having been briefed about the meeting
of MJ-12 members on July 16 at the White House, likely developed a
more serious interest in Reich‟s planned operations in Tucson on the
basis of Reich‟s observations of UFOs. This would have explained the
sudden change in attitude on July 27, 1955, when Douglas sent a
telegram to Moise inviting further correspondence. After all, Douglas
had hired Dr. James E. McDonald, the father of scientific ufology, to
head the IAP in 1954.”
Conspiratorial musings or grounded, informed speculation?
Personally, I subscribe to the latter. As an aside, Martin definitely
establishes that Reich drove through Roswell on his way to Tucson, and
there is some intriguing anecdotal evidence that he returned there, but it
remains inconclusive.
Photo 22 – “Contact With Space” title page
The following day, October 11, Reich authorized William Moise to
call the Air Technical Intelligence Command (ATIC) in Dayton, Ohio, and
make an appointment to discuss the seeming disabling of UFOs the previous
day; Moise was in Ohio on his way to Arizona at the time. A meeting with a
General Watson was agreed upon on for October 14. Over the phone Watson
asked Moise, if necessary, could their conference be continued into the
evening, and how did Reich know that the UFOs had been disabled? Reich‟s
assistant arrived at the facility early on the 14th where he was met by a Dr.
Byers, a physicist employed by the command. Byers escorted Moise to the
conference, also attended by a USAF Captain Hill and a civilian named
Harry Haberer. Asking where General Watson was, Moise was told that he
was unable to attend. Angered, he left and returned to his Dayton motel. The
next day he received a call from Captain Hill conveying Watson‟s apologies
and was asked if the report could be made to ATIC Deputy Commander
Colonel Wertenbaker. Moise agreed and they met later that day. Reich‟s
assistant gave an oral presentation and all took notes except the Colonel.
Feeling that this had been a significant meeting and that at least some
breakthrough had been made in interesting a branch of the government in
Reich‟s UFO work, Moise wrote to Reich that “The contact with Col.
Wertenbaker was excellent throughout the conference. He was serious,
intent and looked at me while I talked. He was the only one who did. His
excitement increased as the report progressed.”
Dr. Byers, the physicist, told Moise that he was familiar with Reich‟s work.
Harry Haberer, the civilian in attendance, was described as someone
working on the history of UFOs with the Air Force. Moise continued on to
Arizona after leaving Ohio. Meanwhile, Reich, his son Peter, and several
other colleagues were driving west as well. Each vehicle carried an
appropriate assortment of laboratory equipment and each had a cloudbuster
in tow. Traveling cross-country to Arizona offered a unique opportunity to
observe the sky and the land they passed through. In author David
Boadella‟s words:
Reich‟s account of the 3200-mile journey is a masterpiece of
reportage on subtle nuances that he noticed in the atmosphere, in
vegetation, and in the soil on the journey. To read it is to learn how
much we all walk about with our eyes shut and how insensitive we
tend to be towards the emotional feel of the environment.
The Tucson area had been chosen for several reasons: it was one of
the world‟s hottest and oldest desert regions, no prairie grass grew in the
area, it had not rained a drop over the preceding five years, and the riverbeds
had all been dry for almost half a century. The team arrived at the property
Reich had leased ten miles outside of Tucson on October 19, 1954. Once
settled in, they commenced drawing operations, regularly observing the
atmosphere with their meteorological instruments. Records were kept in
accordance with strict scientific method and individual journals were also
maintained.
Robert McCulloch, another trained cloudbuster operator, also assisted
with the operation. Reich‟s daughter, Dr. Eva Reich, acted as the group‟s
physician. Work began at the end of October and many UFOs were observed
over the area during the nights of October 31 and November 1. By
November 7, moisture in the atmosphere had risen from the usual 15% to
65%, an unheard of relative humidity for the Tucson area. Drawing
continued from the southwest direction. On November 7, the first clouds
were forming thickly and soon covered the sky indicating rain. Then,
without apparent explanation, the clouds began to decompose. That evening,
a large, bright UFO was seen coming up from the north. It moved slowly
southwest until it stopped and hovered for several hours above the southern
horizon. A connection between the dissipation of clouds and the presence of
UFOs in the skies seemed unavoidable after this sequence of events
continued to repeat itself.
Photo 23 – Eisenhower & Douglas
Weather modification was also a subject of genuine interest to
President Eisenhower, and to a number of military and civilian offices
within his Administration. The Tucson-based Institute of Atmospheric
Physics had been founded in 1953 as a direct result of the formation of the
President‟s Advisory Committee on Weather Control earlier that year. An
atmospheric physicist with a background in Naval intelligence was
appointed to the committee as Associate Director, and at some point in
November or December of 1954 may have met with Reich.
Photo 24 – Cover of Ann Druffel’s “Firestorm”
His name was Dr. James E. McDonald, and we know him to be
another scientist of great intelligence, courage and passion, who, like Reich,
had the temerity to attempt bringing the subject of UFOs to the serious
attention of the American public, much to the detriment of both their careers.
Dr. Eva Reich recalled that McDonald had visited the cloudbusting site
when a TV crew came to film their operations, and that both he and her
father had been interviewed for the report. But the interviews never aired.
While it is highly probable that Dr. McDonald would have had a genuine
interest in Reich‟s work, we do not know for sure if the two actually met and
possibly talked.
Photo 25 – page 165 of “Contact With Space”
By November 13, the cloudbusting operation was showing marked
results. The relative humidity had risen to 67% and foliage on observable
mountain ranges had now turned green. Prairie grass was growing for acres
around the leased site, as was the moisture level in the surrounding area.
Rain now seemed imminent in a location which had seen none for five years.
But by that evening the humidity had dropped twenty points to 47%. The
next day, two bright, pulsating, flashing UFOs were seen low in the eastern
sky. Upon direct draw, the first dimmed after an initial stronger blinking,
then remained dim. The second wobbled, then it too, dimmed markedly.
Suddenly a third came up in the east. Early the morning of November 18 yet
another UFO was observed on the horizon; within two hours an Air Force
aircraft was seen circling the area. More UFOs continued to be observed in
direct relationship to the destruction of the relative humidity. The team‟s
operations continued to draw a moist current from the west; it had now
rained in Los Angeles, Nevada and Utah, but not in Tucson.
On the morning of November 29, Reich, looking at the eastern sky
through a three-and-a-half inch refracting telescope, observed a fully
articulated cigar-shaped craft. He writes that his first reaction was to reject
what he was seeing, but windows were clearly observed on the object and
recorded in his drawings. The ship was observed on and off between
December 1 and December 17 by Reich and by others as cloud cover
allowed, and charts of its movements were carefully kept.
Photo 26 – CORE Journal, March 1955
By December 14, the atmosphere in the area of the base camp and in
Tucson itself was oppressive and deadening. Just prior to this his associate,
Dr. Michael Silvert, had transported a small amount of accumulator-
aggravated uranium from Maine to the Tucson site. The material had to be
towed on a cable one hundred feet behind a hired plane as its lead shielding
was unable to contain its altered reaction. At about 4:30 PM, a huge black
cloud formed over the Tucson area, gradually turning deep purple with a
somewhat reddish glow. The background radiation count in the area jumped
to an alarming one hundred thousand counts per minute. The usual
background count had been holding at six to eight hundred counts per
minute. Both the atmospheric and Geiger counter reactions were likely the
result of the accumulator-exposed radioactive material now in the vicinity.
Twelve Air Force planes soon over flew the base camp and their contrails
(made of water vapor) quickly dissolved. Twenty minutes after both
cloudbusters began drawing, the skies cleared. At 5:30 that afternoon four B-
56 bombers flew in low over the site. Reich‟s subjective feeling was that this
incident could properly be categorized as a battle. He had also come to feel
that the „exhaust‟ these craft gave off attacked the relative destroyed
humidity in the surrounding atmosphere.
UFOs continued to be observed over Tucson throughout the rest of
December and footage of the weather modification operations was televised
on the twentieth. The accumulator-exposed radium had now been
incorporated in the cloudbuster apparatus and the extra excitation it caused
in the atmosphere seems to have been the deciding factor in their successful
results. January 3, 6 and 7 saw abundant and repeated rain in Arizona,
particularly in the vicinity of Tucson. The streets of the city were now full of
puddles, the soil was saturated, snow had accumulated on Mount Catalina
and two thousand families had to be evacuated from their perennially dry
river bed homes. The rain then moved on to Texas and New Mexico while
the Phoenix valley experienced a rare fog. The real cause of these anomalous
weather conditions was not lost on a growing segment of Tucson residents
and “A conference with local farmers, business representatives, and banking
officials was scheduled for January 28 to discuss the problem of how to
continue with the desert work after our departure.” But a severe drop in
humidity followed, as did the appearance of more UFOs and the operation
continued with rain again soaking the area on February 17. The following
week, The Tucson Daily Citizen reported that “Good winter storms promise
better range prospects than have been forecasted recently.” Cloudbusting
continued into March, as did the accompanying rainfall. Operations
concluded late that month with the team and equipment returning east in
April.
All of the aforementioned events were officially ignored by the Institute for
Atmospheric Physics. Quoting Reich, “They were busy with a new project,
counting the droplets condensing around dust particles per volume of air,”
this courtesy of a one hundred and fifty thousand dollar grant from the
National Science Foundation. Another IAP project of the period involved the
time-lapse photography of jet planes‟ contrails. Reich had seen and reported
aircraft contrails during various cloudbusting operations, and had observed
their disintegration during operations in Arizona. He even wondered
“Whether the Air Force had actually such problems in mind.” They likely
had. Color movie film from the mid fifties located in the University of
Arizona‟s Physics and Atmospheric Science Building show Air Force jets
being utilized in weather modification experiments. These and the other
findings I‟ve related lead me to believe that our government had a very real
interest in Dr. Reich‟s UFO observations and findings, as well as in his
weather modification work – from the President on down. And while it may
have been a coincidence, in late November 1955, President Eisenhower‟s
“Atoms for Peace.” proposal – a plan for the peaceful use of atomic energy -
was accepted by the United Nations. Some months prior to this, Reich had
sent Eisenhower a copy of his paper documenting the Oranur Experiment,
and the operations and experiments that had sprung from it. The paper was
titled “Atoms for Peace.”
Photo 27 – 1954 and 1955 Orgone Institute publications on the FDA
injunction
Reich‟s contempt trial could easily be made the subject of a longer
talk than this one, but here are the basics of what transpired. The FDA as
you‟ll recall began to build its case shortly after Mildred Brady‟s article
appeared in 1947, but making the case was not proving easy. None of
Reich‟s past or current patients, or any of those seeing the other physicians
he‟d trained in medical orgone therapy had registered a complaint with the
FDA, or with any other agency for that matter. Neither had Reich or his
associates broken any laws, but the FDA remained undeterred in their
efforts. After all, they knew he was a fraud and saw their responsibility as
bringing this sex obsessed medical menace to justice.
So it was that the Federal Drug Administration went to Federal Court
and brought a complaint against the interstate shipment of orgone energy
accumulators, or any other related therapeutic materials. Their big break
came in 1955 when one of Reich‟s physicians, Dr. Michael Silvert,
carelessly shipped accumulators to New York from Maine without his
mentor‟s knowledge or permission. Upon consideration, Reich decided to
take personal responsibility for the injunction‟s violation. He then wrote to
the judge explaining his decision, noting he was aware that his argument
might be rejected. It was, and the violation stood.
Photo 28 – Reich student Lois Wyvell’s September 1956 trial protest
pamphlet
FDA agents began appearing on Reich‟s Maine property shortly
thereafter, but he refused to allow them any access to his scientific
equipment or written materials and continued on with his experiments. This
resulted in a contempt of court citation, and while their original legal parry
had been a civil matter, it now graduated to a criminal action and a court
date was set. Given the betrayals of both his lawyers, Reich decided to
represent himself in court, against the advice of some of his closest
colleagues. He also chose to make the trial a forum for the validity of his
research and findings. Eloquent though he was, the judge would have none
of it. Wilhelm Reich was convicted of contempt of court and sentenced to
two years in Lewisburg Federal Penitentiary in Pennsylvania. He was fifty
nine years old. Beginning that year, 1956, and continuing into the final
months of the Eisenhower Administration, the FDA confiscated and burned
more than eight tons of his hardcover books, scientific monographs and
other original writings, in government incinerators – to the best of our
knowledge without ever once having attempted to replicate any of his
published experiments.
Once incarcerated, prison authorities determined that the new inmate
should undergo a psychiatric evaluation. Staff psychiatrists noted that he
“gave no concrete evidence of being mentally incompetent,” but officially
diagnosed him as suffering from paranoid schizophrenia, this while
admitting their finding was “not based on physical evaluation.” Early release
was denied him and the Supreme Court chose not to comment on his final
writ. Wilhelm Reich was found dead in his cell at Lewisburg on November
3, 1957, just seven days before his scheduled release date. The account I‟ve
related to you represents only the briefest sketch of the events and actions
discussed.
Repeat photo 1 – 1946 portrait of Reich
Since his death, most accounts of Dr. Wilhelm Reich‟s life and work,
be they supportive or otherwise, follow a similar logic: that the level of
importance which he ascribed to his UFO observations were, in themselves,
a means of “proving,” or at least suggesting that he had gone quite mad
during his last years. But with no real interest in honest scientific inquiry or
method, and little if any appreciation of serious UFO studies or orgonomy,
his detractors tend to write in angry displays of public-spirited concern,
warning the reader away, like police at the scene of an accident.
In Contact With Space, Reich dares, as a scientist, to exercise a most
precious right: the right to challenge an established and accepted belief, the
right to think a thought, no matter how others might perceive it, recording
that thought for publication and standing by it in the face of almost universal
criticism. Apparently the very act of claiming to have observed UFOs, and,
over time, their behavior, interacting with them via the cloudbuster,
ascribing to them intelligence and intention, keeping the Air Force, the CIA,
the National Weather Bureau and the office of the President appraised of his
activities, and finally, the posthumous publishing of Contact With Space,
proved intolerable to all by a few. It was simply preferable to dismiss his
UFO work as bearing witness to a great mind finally derailed, rather than
give it the consideration it deserves. All the more reason it is important to
recall that many of history‟s most brilliant and influential scientists and
social thinkers were declared out of touch with reality or insane during their
time, only to be vindicated by a future that was better equipt to accept their
revolutionary leaps in thinking or discoveries.
Do Wilhelm Reich‟s observations, deductions and conclusions
concerning UFOs all conform to the best contemporary knowledge on the
subject? The majority of them do, and his sighting reports and accounts are
virtually identical to those made by countless other individuals both then and
now. Is the power source of UFOs based on their successfully having
harnessed the great sea of energy we live in? While the question has never
been the subject of a serious ufological investigation, I think Reich makes a
respectable case for this possibility, and not just in theoretical terms. Can we
say with certainty that his death was the result of a conspiracy, or of foul
play tracing back to MJ-12, the Federal Drug Administration, Soviet
intelligence, the Communist Party, or those individuals in power who tend to
mystify biology, then mechanically attempt to impose their own sex-
negative morality on the rest of us? No. And the fact is that at the time of his
death, Dr. Reich suffered from high blood pressure, was overweight, and a
chronic smoker. But, based on what he and his work represented to such
diverse and powerful groups, among others, would any (or all) of the
aforementioned have desired his death and possessed the will and means to
implement it? Oh yes. Without a doubt. And with the official, autopsied
cause of death listed as a heart attack, the question of murder is likely to
remain an open one.
Irregardless of whether he was murdered or died of natural causes,
humanity lost a brilliant and courageous social thinker and man of science
forty nine years ago, and one whose UFO-related work deserves serious
study by any student of the subject. I hope this paper will encourage some of
you to read the available works of Reich, and to seek out the truths he
established for yourself. While the most recent of the events I‟ve described
here today linger in a history nearly fifty years past, they continue to remain
as important, shattering and relevant as if they‟d occurred last week.
Knowledge is often its own reward and anyone who takes the time to
educate themselves to Wilhelm Reich‟s work will only benefit from it. And,
as always seems the case, those who ignore the lessons of history are
destined to repeat them. Thank you for your attention.
* * * * *
REFERENCES
1. Scharaf, M.: Fury On Earth: A Biography of Wilhelm Reich. New York, St.
Martin‟s Press/Marek, 1983
2. Reich, W, and edited by Boyd Higgins, M., and Raphael, C.: Passion of Youth:
An Autobiography. New York, Farrar Straus Giroux, 1998
3. Reich, W, and edited by Boyd Higgins, M.,: American Odyssey: Letters and
Journals, 1940-1947, New York, Farrar Straus Giroux, 1999
4. Martin, J.: Wilhelm Reich and the Cold War. Ft. Bragg, California, Fort Bragg
Books, 2000 (Note: Like Reich‟s Contact With Space, Wilhelm Reich and the
Cold War was published in an edition of 500 copies, with all copies of Martin‟s
book going to subscribers who underwrote the cost of his research. I am hopeful
that we will see another edition of this important book in the not too distant
future.)
5. Robbins, P.: Wilhelm Reich and UFOs. The Journal of Orgonomy, Volume 24,
Number 2, New York, Orgonomic Publications, Inc, 1990
6. Robbins, P.: Wilhelm Reich and UFOs, Part II: Examining Evidence and
Allegations. The Journal of Orgonomy, Volume 25, Number 1, New York,
Orgonomic Publications, Inc, 1991
7. Reich, W.: Wilhelm Reich Biographical Material: History of the Discovery of the
Life Energy (American Period, 1939-1952) Documentary Volume A – XI – E, The
Einstein Affair. Rangeley, Maine: Orgone Institute Press, 1953.
8. Reich, W.: Contact With Space. Rangeley, Maine: Orgone Institute Press, 1957
9. Eden, J.: Planet in Trouble: The UFO Assault on Earth, New York, The
Exposition Press, 1973
10. Greenfield, J.: Wilhelm Reich VS. The U.S.A., New York, W.W. Norton &
Company, Inc., 1974
11. Westrum, R.: “The Blind Eye of Science,” The Whole Earth Review, No. 52, Fall,
1986
12. Boadella, D.: Wilhelm Reich: The Evolution of His Work. London: Vision Press,
1973.
13. Conversations with Dr. Elsworth F. Baker, Reich‟s first assistant for the last
eleven years of his life*. Personal note: I was in therapy with Dr. Baker for about
six years.
14. Conversations with Dr. Myron Sharaf, Reich‟s student, patient, coworker and
biographer**
15. Conversations with Scientist and author*** Dr. James DeMeo, who continues to
demonstrate that Reich‟s weather modification apparatus‟s and techniques work,
and in no uncertain terms.
16. Conversations with investigative writer, author**** and Reich scholar, Jim
Martin.
* Man in the Trap, Baker, Elsworth, F., Macmillan, NY, 1967
** Fury On Earth, Sharaf, Myron, St. Martins/Marek, 1983
*** Saharasia: the 4000 bce Origins of Child Abuse, Sex-Repression, Warfare
and Social Violence in the Deserts of the Old World, DeMeo, James,
OBRL, OR, 1998
**** Wilhelm Reich and the Cold War, Martin, Jim, Flatland Books, CA, 2000
As of this writing I believe all books written by Wilhelm Reich are currently out of print,
but various editions are available from many used book stores and Internet book services.
Recommended sources of information on Reich and his work are Flatland Books
www.flatlandbooks.com, The Orgone Biophysical Research Laboratory
www.orgonelab.org, The Wilhelm Reich Museum www.wilhelmreichmuseum.org, The
American College of Orgonomy www.orgonomy.org, and Abe Books
www.abebooks.com . Books by Wilhelm Reich include
Beyond Psychology: Letters and Journals, 1934-1939
American Odyssey: Letters and Journals, 1940-1947
The Bioelectrical Investigation of Sexuality and Anxiety
The Bion Experiments
The Cancer Biopathy
Contact With Space
Character Analysis
Children of the Future
Early Writings, Volume One
Ether, God and Devil / Cosmic Superimposition
The Function of the Orgasm
Genitality
The Impulsive Character
The Invasion of Compulsory Sex-Morality
Listen, Little Man!
The Mass Psychology of Fascism
The Murder of Christ
Passion of Youth: An Autobiography
People in Trouble
Record of a Friendship: Wilhelm Reich and A.S. Neill
Reich Speaks of Freud
Selected Writings
The Sexual Revolution